Alan Milburn says it was wrong to axe the Education Maintenance Allowance

Mr Milburn calls for the restoration of a revised form of the EMATimes photographer, Tom Pilston

The Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) designed to encourage poorer 16 to 17-year-olds stay on at school should never have been abolished by the coalition government, according to Alan Milburn, the government’s adviser on social mobility.

He also said its replacement, a bursary to waive the first year of university tuition fees for the very poorest students, is not working and the loss of EMA is a block on social mobility.

Mr Milburn instead calls for the cost of the bursary, due to rise in value to £261m by 2015/16, to be used to restore a revised form of the EMA.

His proposal, unlikely to be taken up by the Government which only just abolished the EMA, is part of his wider assessment of how the…